iillis 


Klu-Klux  Klan 


THE  LIBRARY 
OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  CALIFORNIA 
LOS  ANGELES    . 


r 


fTHE  KU-KLUX  KLAN 


Rev,  James  M.  Gillis,  C.S.P. 


New  York 

THE  PAULIST  PRESS 

120  West  60th  St  rest 


-*-0  9  x» 


THE  KU-KLUX  KLAN 


BY  REV.   JAMES   M.  GILLIS,   C.S.P. 

HE  most  curious  combination  of  comedy 
and  tragedy,  of  melodrama  and  bur- 
lesque, of  buffoonery  and  villainy  that 
has  appeared  in  America,  is  the  Ku- 
Klux  Klan.  At  this  late  date  in  the  his- 
tory  of  the  world,  it  is  difficult  to  achieve  distinction 
in  the  commission  of  crime.  But  the  Klan  has  at^ 
/  least  achieved  peculiarity.  It  combines  nonsense 
with  murder.  If  one  were  to  meet  a  mob  of  Klansmen 
leading  their  victim  to  a  whipping  party  or  a  tarring 
and  feathering  "bee,"  one  might  imagine,  from  their 
appearance  and  their  antics,  that  they  were  a  class  of 
sophomores  hazing  a  freshman.  Even  as  they  built 
a  fire  and  heated  their  irons,  to  brand  their  victim 
with  the  insignia,  K.  K.  K.,  one  might  imagine  that 
Ihey  were  still  joking.  The  proceedings  might  be  only 
an  initiation  into  a  college  fraternity.  When  the  jok- 
ers have  frightened  the  candidate  to  "within  an  inch 
of  his  life,"  surely,  one  mJght  think,  they  will  suddenly 
laugh  at  him  and  let  him  go.  Here  and  now,  so  far 
away  from  Fiji  or  Borneo  or  the  Cannibal  Islands^ 
and  so  long  after  Cotton  Mather  and  the  human  bon- 
fires at  Salem,  it  seems  incredible  that  men  could  sear 
the  flesh  of  a  fellow  human  being,  or  actually  burn 
him  alive.  Incredible,  but  it  is  true.  One  of  the  para- 
doxes of  civilization  is  that  in  this  land  of  libraries 
and  schools  and  churches,  in  the  era  of  the  automo- 
bile and  the  aeroplane  and  the  radio,  it  is  still  pos- 
«;i})lc  for  men  to  put  a  human  being  in  a  steel  cage, 

1376623  / 


THE    KU-KLUX    KLAN 

and  roast  him,  while  they  dance  around  the  fire, 
shouting,  laughing,  merrymaking  as  if  at  a  barbecue. 
It  is  still  more  paradoxical — and  more  humiliating — 
that  America  is  the  only  land  in  which  such  atrocities 
really  take  place.  The  Bolsheviki  do  not  burn  people 
alive.  Canadian  soldiers  were  not  crucified  by  the 
Germans  in  Belgium.  Even  the  inferential  insult  to 
Tahiti  and  Borneo  must,  on  second  thought,  be  with- 
drawn. No  such  things  are  done  in  the  Cannibal 
Islands  as  are  done  in  Texas  and  Georgia  and  Ala- 
bama, and  in  some  more  northerly  States.  The  Ku-  a 
Klux  Klan  is  indeed  a  malignant  phenomenon.  ^^J[ 

But — again  the  curious  combination — the  Klan  is 
none  the  less  ridiculous.  Even  in  the  act  of  crime, 
the  Klansmen  act  like  clowns.  The  murder-gang  mas- 
querades as  a  Halloween  party.  Therein  lies  its  chief 
distinction.  Therein,  also,  is  one  of  the  difficulties  of 
dealing  with  it.  We  need  a  champion  to  fight  against 
the  Klansmen.  But  if  we  could  choose  our  cham- 
pion, from  the  living  or  the  dead,  I  hesitate  to  say 
whether  we  should  summon  Daniel  Webster  or  Mark 
Twain.  Webster  would  thunder  at  them.  Mark 
Twain  would  make  game  of  them.  And — for  the 
moment  at  least — I  think  that  the  humorist  would  be 
more  efficient  than  the  statesman  and  orator.  One 
thing  is  certain.  If  we  do  not  laugh  at  the  Klansmen, 
the  rest  of  the  world  will  laugh  at  us.  As  a  carica- 
ture of  America,  the  Klan  is  infinitely  more  absurd 
than  Main  Street.  Babbitt  is  not  nearly  so  prepos- 
terous as  William  Joseph  Simmons,^  the  "Imperial 
Wizard."      # 

As  is  always  the. case  with  those  who  appeal  to  the 

1  William  Joseph  Simmons  later  was  succeeded  by  a  man  named 
Clarke.  Clarke  was  ousted  and  Simmons  became  a  second  time 
head   of  the   order.      In    November   1922,    Simmons    was    "kicked    up-  I 

fctairs,"    being    given    the    title,    "Emperor    for    Life."      The    present 
Imperial   Wizard   is   H.   W.   Evans. 

2 


THE    KU-KLUX    KLAN 

sense  of  humor  in  others,  without  having  any  humor 
in  themselves,  the  masters  of  the  Klan  are  never  so 
funny  as  when  they  are  most  solemn.  Their  ritual  is 
claptrap.  Their  sacred  ceremonies  are  extravaganza. 
Their  oflBcial  documents  are  "highfalutin,"  "bunkum." 
Witness  this  grandiloquent  salutatory  of  the  "Im- 
perial Wizard"  to  his  worshipful  underlings: 

The  Most  Sublime  Lineage  in  all  History, 

Commemorating  and  Perpetuating  the  Most  Dauntless 
Organization  Known  to  Man. 

Imperial  Palace 

Knights  of  the  Ku-Klux  Klan 

incorporated 

Atlanta,  Georgia 

To  all  Genii,  Grand  Dragons,  and  Hydras  of 
Realms,  Grand  Goblins  and  Kleagles  of  Domains, 
Grand  Titans  and  Furies  of  Provinces,  Giants, 
Exalted  Cyclops  and  Terrors  of  Klantons,  and  to 
all  citizens  of  the  Invisible  Empire,  Knights  of 
the  Ku-Klux  Klan — in  the  name  of  our  valiant, 
venerated  Dead,  I  affectionately  greet  you.  .  .  . 

And  the  conclusion  of  the   same  manifesto: 

Done  in  the  Aulic  of  his'  Majesty,  Imperial 
Wizard,  Emperor  of  the  Invisible  Empire, 
Knights  of  the  Ku-Klux  Klan,  in  the  Imperial 
City  of  Atlanta,  on  this  the  ninth  day  of  the  ninth 
month  of  the  year  of  Our  Lord,  1921,  and  on  the 
Dreadful  Daj'  of  the  Weeping  Week  of  the 
Mournful  Month  of  the  year  of  the  KljJn  LV. 

Duly  signed  and  sealed  by  His  Majesty, 

(Signed)   William  Joseph  Simmons, 

Imperial  Wizard. 


THE    KU-KLUX    KLAN 

Is  this  lunacy  or  charlatanism?  Or  both?  It  is  so 
silly,  and  yet  so  serious.  Chesterton  has  remarked, 
with  his  usual  acumen,  that  those  who  take  them- 
selves most  seriously  are  the  insane.  Perhaps,  then, 
the  Imperial  Wizard  should  be  committed  to  a  mad- 
house rather  than  a  jail.  The  Kleagles,  and  Klexters, 
and  other  nabobs  should  go  with  him.  The  rank  and 
fire — the  Klanfools — might  then  be  sent  to  sanitar- 
iums to  undergo  treatment  for  gullibility. 

But  let  us  made  no  mistake.  William  Joseph  Sim- 
mons may  be  as  "mad  as  a  March  hare,"  but  he  is  as 
shrewd  as  P.  T.  Barnum.  He  knows  his  America  as 
well  as  Get-Rich-Quick  Wallingford.  We  shall  see 
this  presently.  But,  meanwhile,  let  us  have  a  bit  of 
Klan  melodrama. 

"After  fourteen  years  of  preparation"  (it  is  the 
original  Imperial  Wizard  who  is  speaking),  "on 
Thanksgiving  Night  in  the  year  1915,  thirty-four  in- 
trepid spirits  made  their  way  to  a  mountain  near  At- 
lanta, and  there  on  the  mountain  top,  at  the  midnight 
hour,  while  men  braved  the  surging  blasts  of  the  wild 
wintry  mountain  winds,  and  endured  a  temperature 
far  below  freezing,  bathed  in  the  sacred  glow  of  the 
fiery  cross,  the  Invisible  Empire  was  called  forth  from 
its  slumber  of  half  a  century." 

O  sacred  recollections  of  the  good  old  guileless  days 
of  melodrama!  "It's  a  hard  night  on  the  banks,  boys! 
Heaven  help  those  who  go  down  to  the  sea  in  ships  on 
such  a  night  as  this !"  "It's  a  hard  night  on  the  moun- 
tain top,  boys !  Heaven  help  the  'intrepid  spirits'  who 
brave  the  wintry  blasts  of  a  Thanksgiving  Night  in 
Georgia!" 

Picture  those  patriots  of  the  peak  leaving  the  open 
fireplace,  or  the  barber-shop  stove,  or  the  Union  Sta- 
tion radiator,  pressing  on  fearlessly  by  trolley  to  Stone 

4 


THE    KU-KLUX    KLAN 

Mountain,  twelve  miles  away,  and  climbing  in  a  "tem- 
perature far  below  freezing"  even  to  the  very  tip, 
reaching  the  dizzy  altitude  of  eighteen  hundred  feet. 
How  insignificant,  by  camparison,  are  the  exploits  ol 
Peary,  or  Amundsen,  or  Robert  Scott! 

Unfortunately,  at  this  point  in  the  record,  the  Im- 
perial Wizard's  English  becomes  a  bit  blurred.  We 
cannot  tell  whether  it  was  the  Invisible  Empire,  or  the 
intrepid  thirty-four,  or  the  mountain  top,  that  was 
"bathed  in  the  sacred  glow  of  the  fiery  cross."  But 
though  the  syntax  be  somewhat  scrambled,  the  story 
is,  none  the  less,  graphic  and  thrilling.  Under  the 
spell  of  the  Wizard's  words,  the  Invisible  Empire  be- 
comes visible.  We  can  see  it,  awaking  like  Rip  Van 
Winkle,  from  its  long  sleep,  stretching  its  arms, 
blinking  in  the  light  of  the  fiery  cross,  stiffly  and  la- 
boriously rising  to  its  feet,  yawning  wearily:  "Ho! 
ho!  there's  bloody  work  to  be  done,  negroes  to  be 
burned,  solitary  men  to  be  tarred  and  feathered, 
women  to  be  stripped  and  w'hipped.  Yea,  there's 
work  for  'intrepid  spirits'  to  do!  Fe,  fi,  fo,  fum!" 

Or  course,  this  sophisticated  generation,  which  only 
laughs  at  melodrama,  will  ask  irreverently:  "Had  the 
intrepid  spirits  no  homes?  Are  there  no  halls  to  be 
hired  in  Atlanta?  Would  not  the  landlady  let  them 
use  the  back  parlor  for  the  evening?  Or  could  they 
not  have  assembled  on  a  vacant  lot,  safe  and  warm 
behind  the  billboards?  Why  should  they  go  to  the 
top  of  a  mountain,  far,  far  away  in  the  suburbs?" 

The  Imperial  Wizard  has  not  recorded  the  message 
delivered  that  terrible  night  on  the  mountain  top,  but 
very  probably  it  was  in  substance  the  same  that  he  has 
frequently  delivered  ever  since:  "This  great  nation, 
with  all  it  provides,  can  be  snatched  away  from  you 
between  the  rising  and  the  setting  of  one  sun  ...  in 

5 


THE    KU-KLUX    KLAN 

the  space  of  one  day,  and  that  day  of  no  more  than 
ten  hours;  when  the  hordes  of  aliens  walk  to  the  bal- 
lot box  (!)  and  their  votes  outnumber  yours,  then 
that  alien  horde  has  got  you  by  the  throat.  Ameri- 
cans will  awaken  from  their  slumber  and  rush  out 
for  battle.  The  soil  of  America  will  run  red  with  the 
blood  of  its  people. "- 

I  confess  that  I  cannot  visualize  that  scene  as  vividly 
as  the  scene  on  the  mountain  top.  The  description  is 
rather  puzzling.  The  "aliens"  walk  to  the  ballot  box. 
But  if  they  are  aliens  and  walk  to  the  ballot  box,  they 
will  simply  have  to  walk  right  home  again.  Aliens  do 
not  vote  in  the  United  States.  If  the  "aliens"  vote, 
they  have  been  naturalized,  and  if  they  have  been 
naturalized,  they  are  no  longer  "aliens,"  but  citizens. 
Are  we  to  understand  that  the  Klan  is  opposed  to  all 
naturalization?  And  are  they,  then,  opposed  to  the 
Constitution,  which  legalizes  naturalization? 

It  seems  also  that  while  the  "aliens"  are  voting,  the 
"100  per  cent  Americans"  are  slumbering.  Do  the 
"aliens"  outnumber  the  Americans  at  the  polls  be- 
cause the  Americans  take  advantage  of  the  holiday  to 
remain  in  bed?  And  are  they  who  remain  in  bed  on 
Election  Day  one  hundred  per  cent.  Americans?  Is  it 
blameworthy  for  naturalized  citizens  to  exercise  their 
constitutional  right  to  vote?  It  is  all  rather  confus- 
ing. However,  the  aliens  seize  the  sleeping  patriots  by 
the  throat:  the  patriots  awake:  the  soil  of  America 
runs  red  with  their  blood.    So  much,  at  least,  is  clear. 

1  have,  perhaps,  insinuated  that  Simmons  is  insane. 
But  "though  this  be  madness,  yet  there  is  method  in 
it."  He  is  "but  mad  north-north-west:  when  the  wind 
is  southerly,"  he  knows  "a  hawk  from  a  handsaw." 
He  knows  which  side  of  his  bread  is  buttered.    And 

2  The   Searchlight.   William    Joseph    Simmons.     April    30,   1921. 

r, 


v 


THE    KU-KLUX    KLAN 

he  knows  how  to  get  the  bread  and  butter.  While 
he  was  still  occupying  the  position  of  "Imperial  Wiz- 
ard," he  claimed  that  there  were  two  million  members 
of  the  Klan.  The  initiation  fee  is,  or  was,  $10.00  per 
head.  For  regalia,  the  Klanfools  pay  $6.50.  But  the 
regalia  consists  only  of  a  nightgown  and  a  mask,  and 
is  worth,  perhaps,  $1.50.  Therefore,  two  million  initi- 
ations produce  a  profit  of  thirty  million  dollars — 
and  all  this  in  five  or  six  years.  I  have  compared 
Simmons  with  Barnum  and  with  Get-Rich-Quick 
Wallingford.  But,  after  all,  compared  with  the  Im- 
perial Wizard,  Barnum  and  Wallingford  were  only 
tyros.  Even  the  editors  and  owners  of  the  Menace 
were,  likewise,  amateurs  at  money-making.  Earl 
McClure  made  $100,000;  W.  L.  Phelps  made  $300,000; 
Marvin  Brown  made  $50,000.  But  what  are  the 
paltry  sums  of  $100,000  or  even  $300,000,  in  fifteen 
or  twenty  years  over  against  $30,000,000  in  five  years? 
But  let  us  not  fail  to  notice  that  there  is  always  a 
mine  of  religious  bigotry,  here  in  America,  and  that 
those  who  work  it  are  sure  of  quick  and  substantial 
profits.  Wallingford  made  his  money  on  carpet  tacks. 
Others  go  in  for  patent  medicines.  Still  others  invent 
a  "sure  cure  for  baldness."  Recently,  bootlegging 
has  become  the  favorite  path  to  sudden  wealth.  But 
of  all  frauds  and  "fakers,"  the  "brewers  of  bigotry" 
are  the  shrewdest.  They  make  money  faster  and 
more  abundantly  than  any  other  kind  of  charlatans; 
and  while  they  grow  rich,  they  have  the  added  conso- 
lation of  being  reputed  patriots  or  saints,  or  both. 
Barnum  was  right.  "The  public  loves  to  be  humbug- 
ged." And  Ben  Franklin  was  right.  "A  fool  and  his 
money  are  soon  parted."  But  the  Imperial  Wizards 
are  not  the  fools.  Nor  the  Grand  Goblins,  nor  the 
Titans,   nor  the  Kleagles,   nor  the   Exalted   Cyclops. 

7 


THE    KU-KLUX    KLAN 

They  are  "getting  theirs  while  the  getting  is  good." 
The  fools  are  those  who  pay  $10.00  for  initiation  and 
$6.50  for  a  sheet. 

However,  it  is  time  to  be  serious — though  not  too 
serious.  There  is  always  a  tendency  to  maintain  that 
any  contemporary  evil  is  "the  worst  ever."  But  there 
have  been  far  worse  outbursts  of  bigotry  than  that  of 
the  modern  Ku-Klux  Klan.  It  may  be  that  the  Klan 
has  not  yet  reached  the  peak  of  its  pernicious  activi- 
ties. Conditions  may  get  worse  before  they  get  bet- 
ter. But  it  is  a  fact  that  thus  far  the  Ku-Klux  Klan 
has  not  accomplished  nearly  so  much  villainy  as  the 
"Native  American"  Movement,  of  the  thirties  and 
forties,  or  the  "Know-nothing"  Movement,  of  the  fif- 
ties, in  the  last  century.  In  those  troublous  times, 
when  Catholics  were  as  few  all  over  the  United  States 
as  they  are  now  in  the  Southern  States,  they  suf- 
fered more  persecution  than  the  Klan  can  possibly 
inflict  today.  Mobs  were  formed  and  ran  riot  every- 
where, burning  or  dynamiting  churches,  convents, 
academies,  and  even  hospitals. 

In  Philadelphia,  in  1844,  two  Catholic  churches 
were  burned  to  the  ground.  Catholic  worship  was 
suspended,  the  homes  of  Catholics  were  invaded  and 
destroyed  and  their  occupants  deliberately  murdered. 

At  Cincinnati,  a  mob  of  six  hundred,  with  firebrands 
and  ropes,  attacked  the  Cathedral,  with  intent  to 
burn  it  and  to  hang  a  papal  nuncio,  who  was  the  guest 
of  the  bishop.  Similar  disturbances,  and  worse,  took 
place  in  dozens  of  other  cities  and  towns.  From 
Louisville,  Bishop  Spalding  wrote  in  August  1855: 
"We  have  just  passed  through  a  reign  of  terror,  sur- 
passed only  by  the  Philadelphia  riots.  Nearly  one 
hundred  poor  Irish  have  been  butchered  or  burned 
and  some  twenty  houses  have  been  consumed  in  the 

8 


THE    KU-KLUX    KLAN 

flames.  The  city  authorities,  all  Know-nothings, 
looked  calmly  on,  and  they  are  now  endeavoring  to 
lay  the  blame  on  the  Catholics." 

Politically,  too,  the  Know-nothings  were  active.  In 
Philadelphia,  Baltimore,  New  York,  New  Orleans,  and 
San  Francisco  (to  say  nothing  of  scores  of  smaller 
cities),  mayors  were  elected  on  anti-Catholic  plat- 
forms. Fifteen  States  elected  Know-nothing  gover- 
nors. In  the  Thirty-fifth  Congress,  which  sat  from 
1857  to  1859,  one  hundred  and  thirteen  representa- 
tives out  of  two  hundred  and  thirty-six,  were  either 
actual  members  of  the  Know-nothing  Party  or  Re- 
publicans who  had  been  elected  to  office  after  an  open 
declaration  of  their  anti-Catholic  convictions. 

In  the  national  election  of  1852,  the  Know-nothings 
claimed  to  control  1,500,000  votes — half  of  the  grand 
total. 

But  the  Know-nothing  Party  collapsed  as  suddenly 
and  as  mysteriously  as  it  had  originated.  When,  in 
1856,  it  nominated  Millard  Fillmore  for  the  Presi- 
dency, he  was  ignominiously  defeated,  receiving  only 
eight  electoral  votes,  all  of  which  were  cast  by  one 
State,  Maryland.  There  is  consolation  in  that  fact 
for  those  who  are  now  worried  about  what  may  be 
the  future  for  Catholics  if  the  Klan  continues  to  grow. 
Organized  Bigotry,  above  all  things  else,  is  spasmodic. 
It  comes  in  waves,  but  the  waves  finally — and  sud- 
denly— break.  The  Ku-Klux  Klan,  up  to  the  present 
has  had  no  such  political  success  as  the  Know-noth- 
ings. It  has  voted  the  parochial  school  out  of  exist- 
ence in  Oregon,  and  elected  a  Senator  from  Texas,  but, 
beyond  that,  it  has  achieved  no  very  important  results 
by  the  ballot. 

As  for  crimes  of  violence  attributable  to  members 
of  the  Klan,  the  New  York  World,  which  conducted  a 

9 


rHE    KU-KLUX    KLAN 

thorough  and  painstaking  investigation,  reports  that 
in  one  year,  October  1920,  to  September  1921,  there 
were  4  murders,  1  "irreparable  mutilation,"  1  brand- 
ing with  acid,  41  floggings,  27  cases  of  tarring  and 
feathering,  and  5  kidnappings,  by  cloaked  and  hooded 
law-breakers  in  the  United  States. 

In  the  year  1922,  conditions  were  worse.  Senator 
D.  I.  Walsh,  of  Massachusetts,  addressing  Attorney 
General  Daugherty,  quotes  from  a  letter  written  to 
him  by  a  lawyer  in  Texas : 

"I  do  not  think  it  would  be  an  exaggeration  to  say 
that  Texas  has  had,  within  the  last  eighteen  months, 
five  hundred  tar  and  feather  parties  and  whipping 
bees,  not  to  mention  a  number  of  homicides,  assaults, 
and  other  offenses  directed  against  the  person;  threat- 
ening letters  by  the  score  have  been  given  to  the  vic- 
tims of  this  huge  criminal  conspiracy,  ordering  them, 
in  many  instances,  to  leave  their  homes;  women  have 
been  tarred  and  feathered  and  old  men  in  their  dotage 
have  not  been  spared  their  vengeance;  young  girls 
in  their  teens  and  not  hardly  in  womanhood  have  been 
the  victims  of  these  letters,  and,  in  many  instances, 
they  have  been  forced  to  leave  their  homes  on  ac- 
count of  the  slander  and  ignominy  heaped  on  them. 

"So  far  as  I  know,  not  one  of  these  criminals  has 
been  brought  to  justice.  At  Waco,  the  home  of  the 
Governor  of  Texas,  police  officers  arrested  three 
masked  and  hooded  men  with  their  victim,  covered 
with  hot  tar  and  feathers,  in  their  possession.  The 
Grand  Jury  of  McClennan  County  voted  'No  bill.'  In 
Dallas,  a  Klan  stronghold,  it  is  reported  that  at  least 
fifty  men  have  been  whipped  at  one  place.  One  man, 
prominent  in  the  business  life  of  the  city,  ^as  taken 
from  his  home  and  away  from  his  little  motherless 
girls,  and  beaten.     One  of  his  children,  a  girl,  was 

10 


THE    KU-KLUX    KLAN 

knocked  down  and  injured  while  trying  to  defend  her 
father, 

"At  Teneha,  a  woman  was  tarred  and  feathered  and 
beaten  with  a  wet  rope,  because  she  had  married  a 
second  time.  At  Austin,  the  capital  city  of  the  State, 
numbers  of  outrages  have  been  perpetrated  upon  in- 
dividuals. Every  little  town,  hamlet  and  city  in  the 
State,  with  but  few  exceptions,  have  had  their  little 
'patriotic  fetes,'  featuring  hot  tar,  feathers,  and  wet 
ropes.  It  would  astound  the  people  of  the  United 
States  if  the  truth  about  this  organization  in  Texas 
could  be  given." 

The  Governor  of  Louisiana  thought  it  necessary 
to  make  a  personal  visit  to  President  Harding  to  ask 
federal  cooperation  in  a  campaign  against  the  outrages 
of  the  Klan.  While  the  Governor  was  at  the  Capital, 
alarming  accounts  were  printed  in  the  newspapers, 
declaring  that  "the  invisible  Empire"  had  grown  to 
such  an  extent,  and  had  so  far  usurped  all  power  that 
the  administration  of  law  and  order  had  become 
''negligible"  in  certain  parts  of  the  State  of  Louisi- 
ana. Governor  Parker  denounced  these  reports  as 
exaggerations.  But  the  actual  seriousness  of  the  situ- 
ation, which  led  him  to  make  his  visit  and  his  appeal 
to  Washington,  he  did  not  deny. 

The  conditions  existing  in  Texas  and  Louisiana 
fairly  illustrate  the  state  of  the  case  throughout  the 
South  and  Southwest.  In  the  North,  the  Middle  West, 
and  parts  of  the  far  West,  the  Klansmen  are  equally 
virulent,  and  perhaps  w^ould  be  equally  violent  were 
it  not  that  in  these  sections  Catholics  are  too  numer- 
ous to  be  seriously  molested.  Right  there  is  a  hint 
as  to  the  principal  characteristic  of  the  Klansmen— 
their  cowardice. 

It  is  conceivable  that  a  mob  may  sometimes  be  a 

II 


/ 


THE    KU-KLUX    KLAN 

random  aggregation  of  heroes.  But  a  masked  mob 
is  always  an  aggregation  of  cowards.  The  French 
revolutionists,  who  stormed  the  Bastille,  in  the  days 
of  Louis  XVL,  were  risking  their  lives.  They  were  a 
mob  only  because  they  could  not  be  an  army.  They 
wore  no  masks.  The  mob  that  came  by  night  with 
swords  and  staves  into  the  Garden  of  Gethsemane  to 
apprehend  Jesus  Christ,  wore  no  masks.  Even  Judas 
did  not  conceal  his  countenance.  But  a  mob  of  men, 
who  cover  their  faces  with  hoods  and  their  forms  with 
sheets,  is  a  mob  of  cowards.  When  a  man  is  afraid 
to  show  his  colors,  it  must  be  because  he  is  "yellow." 

Furthermore,  the  Klan,  in  its  attacks,  never  allows 
a  man  to  have  a  fighting  chance.  One  man  never 
fights  one  man;  the  man  must  fight  the  mob.  A  mob 
that  attacks  an  army,  like  the  mob  that  precipitated 
the  revolution  in  Russia,  is  certainly  courageous.  It 
is  no  lark  to  go  armed  only  with  pikes  or  pitchforks 
into  the  face  of  machine  guns.  The  Bolsheviki  may 
be  savage,  but  they  are  not  cowards.  But  the  mobs 
of  Klansmen  that  attack  one  solitary  defenseless  per- 
son are  obviously  cowards.  If  one  gang  of  street  boys 
attacks  another  gang,  there  may  be  "fair  play"  be- 
tween them.  But  if  a  whole  gang  attacks  one  de- 
fenseless boy,  the  gang  is  despicable.  If  there  were 
even  an  iota  of  chivalry  in  the  heart  of  a  Klansman, 
he  would  recognize  that  obvious  fact. 

They  have  no  courage.  Likewise  they  have  no 
logic.  They  claim  to  be  "100  per  cent.  American." 
The  truth  is  that  they  would  ruin  America.  There 
could  not  possibly  be  a  more  dangerous  anti-Ameri- 
can society  than  one  which  is  a  law  unto  itself. 
Obedience  to  law,  observance  of  the  established 
means  of  obtaining  justice,  acceptance  of  the  decisions 
of  the  courts,  are  a  sine  qua  non  of  the  existence  of 

12 


THE    KU-KLUX    KLAN 

our  form  of  government.  But  the  Ku-Klux  Klan 
makes  itself  a  police  force,  judge,  jury,  attorney,  exe- 
cutioner, mayor,  governor,  supreme  dictator  in  all 
matters  pertaining  not  only  to  government,  but  to 
manners,  morals,  and  religion.  This  arrogant  society 
has  taken  the  duty  upon  itself  to  warn  gamblers,  adul- 
terers, "joy-riders;"  to  teach  editors  what  they  may 
write  or  publish;  to  dictate  to  judges  on  the  bench 
about  their  decisions.  It  has  violated  the  habeas 
corpus  act.  With  the  alleged  purpose  of  punishing 
crime,  it  has  been  guilty  of  more  serious  crimes — 
unlawful  seizure,  abduction,  punishment  without  trial. 
It  is  a  state  within  the  state,  or  rather  a  state  above 
the  state.  Indeed,  it  claims  to  be  that  most  dangerous 
of  all  institutions,  an  Invisible  Empire.  Being  invis- 
ible, it  is  likewise  intangible  and  irresponsible.  If 
Louis  XIV.  ever  said,  "L'Etat  c'est  moi,"  he  spoke  like 
a  tyrant.  The  Ku-Klux  Klan  repeats  the  words  at- 
tributed to  the  King,  "I  am  the  state." 

The  only  possible  justification  of  such  a  society 
would  be  the  utter  absence  of  law  and  order,  a  condi- 
tion of  anarchy  with  which  the  State  is  unable  to 
cope.  The  Vigilance  Committees  of  early  days  in 
Calfornia  were  necessitated  and  justified  by  the 
chaotic  social  conditions  incidental  to  the  rush  for 
gold.  No  such  conditions  prevail  now  in  any  Ameri- 
can State.  So  long  as  there  is  no  condition  of  an- 
archy, there  is  no  call  for  a  Vigilance  Committee,  and 
still  less  is  there  any  justification  for  a  "Klan."  The 
Klan  will  cause  anarchy,  not  cure  it. 

Again,  the  K.  K.  K.  is  a  menace  to  the  peace  of  the 
country,  because  its  wicked  and  violent  methods 
might  easily  lead  to  retaliation.  If  the  Klan  antago- 
nizes and  persecutes  Catholics,  Jews  and  negroes,  then 
Catholics  and  Jews  and  negroes  have  at  least  equal 

13 


THE    KU-KLUX    KLAN 

right  to  antagonize  their  antagonists,  and  to  persecute 
their  persecutors.  This  will  not  be  done — at  least 
Catholics  will  not  succumb  to  the  temptation  to  cor- 
rect crime  with  crime — but  if  the  day  does  come  when 
the  Ku-Klux  Klan  becomes  strong  enough  to  nullify 
the  administration  of  justice  in  any  State,  or  in  the 
Union,  the  Catholics,  Jews  and  negroes  will  have  to 
defend  themselves  in  the  most  effective  way  possible. 
When  the  Know-nothings,  in  1854,  threatened  to  burn 
St.  Patrick's  Cathedral  in  New  York,  Bishop  Hughes 
asked  his  legal  advisers  the  question:  "Does  the  State 
guarantee  compensation  for  damages  done  by  riot- 
ers?" The  lawyers  replied  that  the  State  makes  no 
such  guarantee.  "Then,"  said  the  Bishop,  "the  State 
intends  that  the  citizens  shall  defend  their  own  prop- 
erty." And  he  published  a  declaration,  saying  that, 
"in  case  all  other  protection  fail,"  Catholics  should 
"defend  their  property  even  with  their  lives.  In  this, 
they  will  not  be  acting  against,  but  for,  the  law." 

That  principle  of  self-defense  is,  of  course,  inde- 
feasible. It  may  be  brought  into  effect  once  again  if 
the  Ku-Klux  Klan  gets  out  of  hand. 

Catholics  will  not  be  driven  to  retaliation.  But 
they  may  be  driven  to  self-defense,  even  to  the  extent 
of  bloodshed.  It  is  natural,  therefore,  that  governors 
and  magistrates  generally  should  bestir  themselves 
to  anticipate  and  to  prevent  the  anarchical  condi- 
tions that  will  prevail  if  the  Klan  is  not  soon  inter- 
rupted in  its  dangerous  and  un-American  campaign 
of  disseminating  racial  and  religious  animosity. 


14 


'^  ■ 


COPYBIGHT,     1922,     BY     "ThE     MiSSIONABY      SOCIETY     OF 

St.  Paul  the  Apostle  in  the  State 
OF  New  York." 


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